Trouble logging in?We were forced to invalidate all account passwords. You will have to reset your password to login. If you have trouble resetting your password, please send us a message with as much helpful information as possible, such as your username and any email addresses you may have used to register. Whatever you do, please do not create a new account. That is not the right solution, and it is against our forum rules to own multiple accounts.

I think it's important to remember that "good, quality posts" is at least somewhat subjective. People can disagree on what constitutes "good, quality posts".

I'll freely admit I posrepped some fairly controversial posts. But in my view, an atypical viewpoint, even if a bit more strongly worded than what's ideal, can add a lot to discussion. I agree with what Gooral wrote about the value of having a wide difference of opinion on threads, so when I saw someone take a bold and controversial stand, I'd often feel compelled to give a "pat on the back" to the person doing that.

I'll also freely admit that there are particular posters that I came back to a lot in posrepping them. But this was almost always because I truly did appreciate the post that I was posrepping, or wanting to thank that person for posrepping me. It's not purely because many of these people are my friends.

Finally, I'll admit I went on at least two or three "posrep runs" in the past because I wanted to posrep a particular member that I was not yet in a position to posrep again (this was often due to that member making a great avatar or sig for me, IIRC). During these posrep runs I would search for posts that I felt were good, or witty, or at least had something to them that I liked.

Ultimately, I tended to view posrep as benign, and not really something that could be abused. Perhaps I was wrong there, as board-wide power creep wasn't something I gave a lot of thought to, admittedly.

What makes you so sure that this is not the "widely-held 'common truth' that isn't really true at all"? I saw posters influenced by rep nearly every day, and tracing the actual rep point flow made this more clear. There was a distinct pattern of people stopping posting in certain threads after getting negative rep whether their opinion was well-stated or not. There was also a distinct pattern of people who posted obnoxious opinions continuing to post in threads where their opinions got them more "rep rewards". And all of this was completely invisible to everyone else.

I don't doubt that this may have occurred, but how is this any different than standard discussions? If you have one person saying something and then a group of other people are speaking against them, they're less likely to keep participating. Similarly, if someone says something and then a bunch of people express agreement - whether by outright saying it, by quoting them approvingly, or by echoing similar lines of thought - they're going to feel emboldened by perceived support. That's just human group dynamics. The reputation system may have put some of the support and detraction behind the scenes, but the dynamics themselves won't change.

Well, what I meant more is that I don't think most people would be so worried about neg rep that they would refuse to even step into a thread. I'm sure it would be more common to shy away from a discussion after getting a negative rep, which would make them frustrated and/or hurt their feelings; but I don't think most people would be so concerned about getting a neg rep that they would not make that initial first post, and many of those people who dropped out of threads might've also done so because they were being bitched out and dogpiled in the thread itself (in much more obnoxious detail since posts can be much longer than the Twitteresque neg reps). I'm mainly just arguing against posts that were made in the past handful of pages here, I forget what anyone might've said during the early ones; and more than anything I'm disagreeing with the severity of the problems that reputation is believed to present, not whether those problems exist at all. I'm not saying there's no truth to some of the more cynical viewpoints concerning Reputation, but I personally doubt that Reputation makes AnimeSuki discussion markedly, significantly worse as some suggest, that Reputation creates a suffocatingly oppressive atmosphere and that AnimeSuki would be a very different place were it absent; I would imagine that although neg reps cause some amount of drama, that the overall quality of discussion here is impacted only a small amount.

I may have more to say later, but in summary great change. Was getting sick of the extreme positivist attitude in that sometimes even the most minute of negative comments can lead to negrepping or in the worse case, use the rep system for bullying cause you dont agree with popular opinion. I know this since a significant amount of negrep comments have been "." or "*insert random single letter here". Hold a grudge much?

AS isn't and shouldn't be MAL or Randomc or sort of anime community that jumps on anyone with anonymous mass negrepping. I mean cmon, if you want to disagree with someone who has a different or negative opinion, have some balls and verbally argue with them.

Ultimately, I tended to view posrep as benign, and not really something that could be abused. Perhaps I was wrong there, as board-wide power creep wasn't something I gave a lot of thought to, admittedly.

This is pretty much what I think at the moment. The more I hear from the mods, the more I really do think that "behind the scenes" reputation is quite a pain to take care of. But many of the users, including me and you, just think of it as benign and fun. I don't think it's impossible to tweak rep for the better either. There will always be people who wants to bypass whatever system we implement, but like I said earlier, I don't think those minority should ruin it for everyone else.

@relentlessflame: My bad, I meant to post more but something went wrong. I edited it quickly. I think you confused me with someone else though, because you never needed to tell me to not post one-liners. In fact, this was what I had to say.

I don't doubt that this may have occurred, but how is this any different than standard discussions? If you have one person saying something and then a group of other people are speaking against them, they're less likely to keep participating. Similarly, if someone says something and then a bunch of people express agreement - whether by outright saying it, by quoting them approvingly, or by echoing similar lines of thought - they're going to feel emboldened by perceived support. That's just human group dynamics. The reputation system may have put some of the support and detraction behind the scenes, but the dynamics themselves won't change.

Sure. But we didn't need an invisible system where an artificial notion of power gives certain individuals that much more sway in these dynamics.

Quote:

Originally Posted by KholdStare

@relentlessflame: My bad, I meant to post more but something went wrong. I edited it quickly. I think you confused me with someone else though, because you never needed to tell me to not post one-liners. In fact, this was what I had to say.

I meant that I already explained to you the nature of the problem we saw with rep, but your "support" for the other post basically ignores the conversation we had less than a few hours ago. I realize that you aren't convinced, but to frame the whole thing as "I think it's being blown out of proportion" when you don't have the facts needed to make that assertion, just because it supports your personal desire... it's just frustrating. It's like why even bother trying to provide information? People will believe whatever they want.

I meant that I already explained to you the nature of the problem we saw with rep, but your "support" for the other post basically ignores the conversation we had less than a few hours ago. I realize that you aren't convinced, but to frame the whole thing as "I think it's being blown out of proportion" when you don't have the facts needed to make that assertion, just because it supports your personal desire... it's just frustrating. It's like why even bother trying to provide information? People will believe whatever they want.

And I wasn't trying to support Reputation, so much as I thought other people might've been a little cynical about human nature. If the facts at your disposal prove that I'm wrong, then alrighty; I'm wrong quite a bit.

I think we have a misunderstanding. I totally agree with you that the current reputation system should be abolished because of the flaws you and others mentioned. My entire point is trying to get support for the idea that it can be fixed for the (far*) future. I'm not exactly trying to convince you, but to get others rally more suggestions on how something else could work without the flaws.

*I also agree that we need to go some time without a reputation system and see if people wants it back/likes this better.

I also want to respond to this before I take a break (just realized I haven't eaten yet today... that's not good... )...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Triple_R

I agree with what Gooral wrote about the value of having a wide difference of opinion on threads, so when I saw someone take a bold and controversial stand, I'd often feel compelled to give a "pat on the back" to the person doing that.

This isn't a comment directed at you in particular. I absolutely want to encourage difference of opinions in threads, and I don't mind at all if it's "bold and controversial" so long it's still respectful. But of course, people can give rep, both positive and negative, for any reason and that was by design. So someone makes a really nasty post, but you agree with their opinion? No problem pos-repping that... Someone makes a really thoughtful post, but they are dissing a show you like in the smallest possible way? Neg-rep that... (Again, this isn't you in particular... just in concept.)

As was said, part of this is just human nature, and removing the system won't eliminate this sort of private encouragement. But it did contribute, as you said, to power inflation, and made it so that certain voices were much, much louder than others (and the only way to catch up was basically to pander to people in power).

Anyway, it made what was supposed to be a fun system into a little bit more manipulative than it should have been, at least in my view.

And I wasn't trying to support Reputation, so much as I thought other people might've been a little cynical about human nature. If the facts at your disposal prove that I'm wrong, then alrighty; I'm wrong quite a bit.

Sorry -- I wasn't trying to "gang up" on you (or KholdStare). As I said, I haven't eaten yet, so I think I'm getting a bit cranky...

Anyway, suffice it to say, that I do understand perfectly well that all things can be used for good and for evil. It is up to people how to use them. The ways the system was used had both positives and negatives. I'm not trying to downplay the positives; I've always tried very hard to be a good poster as much as possible (ever since I arrived, long before I was on the staff) and there was certainly something flattering about seeing that other people appreciate your sincere efforts. And sometimes you'd get positive rep and you'd just be like "what?" and you wouldn't think anything of it. And even negative rep... honestly, one of the bad things about being an Admin is that I became "immune" to the problems other people had with it because everyone knew that I could see who sent it. But I could still see the behaviour very clearly.

So anyway... there were good things, and there were bad things. If I'm pointing out the bad things, it's only because I've seen that it's there. But I've also seen the positive too, and I think we all have. Seeing all sides will help us come up with a better solution, and I *hope* that the staff and I are providing enough information as we can to help flesh it out (although I know that it's sort of piecemeal).

Wow, I actually am quite intrigued by these secret dynamics of the rep system. Not sure why this interests me lol, but I had no idea the rep-garnering was as pervasive as the mods are now revealing. Anyways, for what it's worth, I've probably positive repped trolls and given stupid negative rep myself in the past (honestly, I can't even remember... my use of the rep system has been very, very sporadic), but hopefully this behavior is mitigated somewhat in that I've been on this forum throughout most of my teenage years and was not always as mature of a participant. Glad we can bury the hatchet.

Quote:

Originally Posted by relentlessflame

I also want to respond to this before I take a break (just realized I haven't eaten yet today... that's not good... )...

Intermittent fasting! It's all the rage nowadays in the nutrition community.

Suddenly, my inner web developer and programmer has picked up, and I'm quite curious to know what mathematical expressions were used to determine rep power

Well, it's not so complicated... I had 2376 rep points, and would have a rep power of 32 if it were still active today. Statistically speaking, assuming my rep points didn't change, my rep power would jump to 33 in 74 days. When you first join the forum, you start with 10 rep points, but a reputation power of 0. You have access to all the information you need to *basically* calculate the formula (with a minor exception), and the staff are treated no differently than any other member.

See if you can figure it out (particularly without looking up the variables, or getting similar stats from other members).

Well, it's not so complicated... I had 2376 rep points, and would have a rep power of 32 if it were still active today. Statistically speaking, assuming my rep points didn't change, my rep power would jump to 33 in 74 days. When you first join the forum, you start with 10 rep points, but a reputation power of 0. You have access to all the information you need to *basically* calculate the formula (with a minor exception), and the staff are treated no differently than any other member.

See if you can figure it out (particularly without looking up the variables, or getting similar stats from other members).

Well, the "riddle", as it were, said "assuming my rep points didn't change". I can't say that your answer is totally wrong, but it also isn't totally right (or for the right reasons).

Perhaps I should use another way of phrasing this. If you assume that Solace (for example) had 3000 rep points (I made it up), how much reputation power would he have today? That's a way of testing your formula.